Full Circle
by Tibbins
Summary: Set at the end of 14x01. Everyone in the bunker is feeling the strain and Castiel and Jack have very different views on what should be done next. Destiel.


**Hey guys! So here's a short fic set at the end of 14x01**

 **Just because I had to write _something_ about that moment in the season 14 trailer... you all know the one. **

**Enjoy ^_^**

Castiel sat on the steps of the library. His posture was no longer the ramrod-straight—or as Dean would say, "angel blade up his ass"—thing that it had been when he first met the Winchesters; life and exposure to the best and worst of humanity had cured that particular angelic trait. Now, his shoulders were rounded under an invisible weight and his fingers toyed with the hem of his coat.

Sam had questioned his choice of seat, especially as there was a perfectly good table and set of chairs only feet away, but Castiel had only shaken his head, unable to explain his need to perch like a gargoyle at the entrance to the room his family was sequestered in. Still trying to be a guardian he supposed, as stupid as that was, he'd already failed.

He watched as Sam sighed and pushed away the book he had been hunched over for the past several hours. The hunter rubbed at his red-rimmed eyes and stood, using the table to support him more than he should. Castiel worried that Sam would ask him to heal him of his tiredness again. He knew that he wouldn't be able to refuse, but his angelic healing had its limits and Sam hasn't slept in almost a week. Castiel didn't envy the man, everything had fallen on him since Lucifer was killed. Sam was the one that everyone looked to when they encountered something in this new world that confused them, or if there was a minor household dispute, or when there was a hunt on their radar that promised to be more than a simple salt and burn. It had been his decision to save Nick even though Castiel knew it had nearly killed him to do it. He had to be kind and approachable as well as a figure of authority and although Castiel could see the strain he was under, he could also see how well-suited for this role he would be when he wasn't half out of his mind with worry for his brother.

Castiel didn't ask him if he'd found anything, even if the silence was pressing at him, demanding to be filled with something, anything other than the rawness of what was missing. As though reading his thoughts, Sam looked at him briefly and shook his head, his eyes dark with fatigue and pain.

"I'm going to bed," he said, his voice little more that the scrape of a rusty knife on a slate. Castiel nodded and pressed his lips into the best approximation of a smile.

"Goodnight, Sam."

"Night," Jack mumbled from his own seat, the soft lighting shifting the shadows on his face as he spoke.

Sam's footsteps receded down the hall and Castiel hoped that he would manage to get some actual rest. He sighed and turned to Jack.

"You should go to bed too," he said gently, "you've been pushing yourself too hard. I know you asked Bobby for extra training."

"I'm not tired yet, besides, I wanted to talk to you," Jack set his own tome aside and stood only to sit on the stone outcropping opposite, facing Castiel, "I want to know what our plan is."

"What do you mean?"

"About Michael."

Castiel frowned, " _This_ is the plan, Jack. We keep looking for a way to save Dean."

"And if we can't?" Jack's eyes were solemn, "We've been through every book in this library and found nothing. You and Sam have called everyone you know and found nothing. We've tracked down angels and demons and ancient lore and found nothing. All we know is that Michael is leaving a trail of bodies but we won't do anything about it because you want to wait until we have a way to save Dean. What about saving all the people Michael is murdering? What about them?"

"Jack-" Castiel said hoarsely, he felt cold, which was unusual for a creature that couldn't feel temperature. They _did_ know that Michael was killing people. There were reports of strange deaths from all over the world, eyes burned out in locked rooms, no sign of forced entry, furniture and walls broken and dented from where the people had been thrown but nothing to suggest another person had been there at all. The last one had been a man called Jamil Hamed, a Syrian refugee who lived alone. Nothing linked them, some had held positions of power, others struggling to get by, people of all faiths and nationalities and professions, good people and known killers chosen by Michael seemingly at random.

"I understand that he's your friend," Jack continued, his voice softening slightly, "but you know as well as I do that if Michael was in any other vessel, we wouldn't even consider other options."

"What are you saying exactly?" Castiel shot back, bristling.

"We still have an archangel blade-" the boy began but Castiel cut him off, appalled.

"Jack! Dean is our family."

"Nick survived," Jack pointed out, "you said that archangel blades kill the archangel but not the host, right?"

Castiel grimaced, their guess at how Nick had come out of being possessed by an archangel, _Lucifer_ no less, more or less whole didn't sit right with him. It made no sense that Nick seemed to suffer no worse than Jimmy had, particularly after seeing the state Raphael's vessel had been left in, and that was when the archangel had _chosen_ to leave, not ripped out with devastating finality. There was more to it than the design of the blade, there had to be.

"We don't know that for sure," he said, jolted from his reverie by the pipes rattling as someone used the plumbing in one of the guest rooms, "besides, Nick was still severely wounded, none of us thought that he would make it through the first night."

"None of you wanted him to."

"Jack!"

"What?" Jack snapped, "it's _true_! And I'm not blaming you, I understand; seeing Lucifer but knowing that it isn't him... it's hard. But Nick is fine, doesn't that give you hope?"

An impossible shot, a blade he didn't trust, the devil's vessel in the dungeon, none of it settled his unease.

"We can't guarantee his safety."

"This is about more than just Dean's safety," Jack said, "his isn't the only life on the line. We can't just sit back and do nothing!"

"What could we do if we found him now, Jack?" Castiel said harshly, "I got captured by _demons,_ we barely made it out alive and Michael could have disintegrated every being in that bar without so much as blinking. We can't even _use_ the blade, there are no archangels left! We're not ready." Perhaps he had deliberately misspoken. What he had meant was that _he_ wasn't ready. He wasn't ready to see archangel grace behind Dean's eyes, he wasn't ready to confront Dean with the intent to kill. He didn't think he could do it, even the thought made his insides twist.

"You said my powers would return in time," Jack said, "maybe there's a way to speed that process up. I'm half-archangel and just as powerful, right? I'll do it if I have to. Michael needs to be stopped."

"And if that means Dean dies too?"

"Then he dies!" Jack said heatedly, "Michael is _killing_ people, Castiel. Good people, innocent people! He has a plan that we know nothing about other than it can't be good and from what I can tell, the only thing stopping us stopping _him_ is that his vessel is Dean. Which, firstly, isn't what Dean would want, and secondly, isn't a good enough reason to leave Michael to destroy the planet! I know that Sam can't understand it right now, but I thought that you would be able to see that saving Dean shouldn't be our highest priority."

"Then you don't know me very well at all." Castiel said, his voice taking on the timbre of his grace, just a hint of his true voice bleeding through, the lights flickered, "Saving Dean _is_ my highest priority. Once we have him back, we can figure out the rest but I won't consider a plan that puts him at risk."

Jack looked taken-aback at his display of power, glancing at the light fixtures as they settled back into gentle illumination.

"He's already at risk," Jack said slowly, as though this was something Castiel hadn't considered, "we don't even know if Dean is still around to be saved. I don't understand how you can justify letting Michael do whatever he wants when we have a way to stop him."

"I won't hurt Dean." Castiel said, his voice shaking in a way that was all too human now. He remembered the last time he had said those words, caught between heaven and a crypt; Dean's bloodied face and Naomi's angry one. Dean pleading that they were family, Naomi yelling that it was his duty. Clean white lines and smudges of grey and Dean's soul lighting his way home.

"Castiel," Jack said, bringing him back to the bunker, "you're crying."

Castiel raised his hand to his face, sure enough, his fingers came away wet. He wiped at his cheeks impatiently with the back of his hand and then he sighed, letting go of all his anger at Jack in one breath. The boy's logic was sound after all, it wasn't his fault that Castiel was incapable of listening.

"I'm sorry, Jack," he said, "I know you mean well but you don't understand what Dean… what we've been through together. He was in the position of saying yes to Michael before, many years ago. I stopped him then," he smiled bitterly at the memory, "well, truth be told I beat him to a pulp in an alley and locked him in a basement. I had given up everything for him, he convinced me to rebel against Heaven, he told me that it was the right thing and he made me believe it when that shouldn't have been possible, and I couldn't stand the thought of him giving up when he had just given me a reason to fight."

He closed his eyes and Dean's face swam into view; rounder than it was now, more boyish, his smile closer to the surface despite the pain of Hell being fresh. It said a lot about the intervening years and that made Castiel's heart contract painfully. He known the man barely a few months before deciding to help him, against his orders, against everything he had believed; Dean had prayed to him and he had responded, because he had sounded so desperate and alone, because he had already suffered so much, because angels were _supposed_ to help humans, because Castiel wanted to hear Dean's laugh again, because he wanted to.

"It's been almost ten years since that day," Castiel said, staring down at his hands, "ten years of friendship and loyalty and mistakes and forgiveness. And no matter how bad things got, no matter what threats we faced, or how many times I thought him dead, I could hold on to the fact that I had saved him from becoming Michael's puppet. Because I knew then, as I know now, that Dean Winchester should never be caged. He can't… he won't handle it well." Castiel's breath caught on the intake as the image of Dean imprisoned in a dark box within his own mind floated in front of his eyes. Then he blinked, and Jack was staring back at him, his mouth pursed but his eyes full of empathy.

"God may have invented the concept of free will, but Dean gave me mine," Castiel said, shaking the image from his mind before it changed to something even worse, "and I can't let his story end the way that Heaven said it would. I was supposed to prove them wrong. Dean told me I could prove them wrong."

"Castiel-" Jack began, but Castiel talked over him, barely registering that the boy had spoken,

"I raised him from Hell because those were my orders. But saving him from Michael was my _choice,_ and here we are. Turns out, I never saved him at all."

"I don't think that's true," Jack said quietly, "he was always better when you were around."

Castiel felt like his intestines had just unravelled to drop to his feet and he bit at the meat of his tongue to keep himself from screaming.

"I can't lose him," Castiel said, no longer capable of controlling how desperate he sounded, "not to Michael, not like this."

"Castiel, he might already be lost," Jack leaned forward, reaching a hand out to touch his shoulder but Castiel raised an arm to intercept the gesture.

"No," he growled, "there's still too much left to say."

"I think I understand." Jack said, "You love him, don't you?"

"Of course I-" Castiel stopped, then looked at the pity in Jack's face as the full meaning of his words hit him like a train careening off its tracks. Jack didn't mean that Castiel loved Dean like family, although he did, he loved Dean in that way too.

"Yes."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't ever..." Castiel said, "don't be sorry for that, don't."

Jack opened his mouth to say something else, an apology for his apology perhaps, but before he could, Sam reappeared in the doorway, clutching at his phone in both hands, his eyes wide and alert despite the shadows beneath them, his hair was sticking up as though he'd run his hand through it backwards several times. Castiel was on his feet instantly, preparing for action.

"Guys," Sam said breathlessly, as though he was daring them to contradict the hope radiating from him, "I've got a lead on Michael. Jo just called."

"Jo? You mean Anael?"

"Yeah, she's with Michael, or she _was_ , we've gotta go talk to her."

"Could it be a trap?" Jack asked, standing too.

"Does it matter?" Castiel said, staring at the younger Winchester brother, "we're going anyway, right, Sam?"

Sam grinned, "Of course."

 **So there you have it. What do you think? Is is believable? I hope it wasn't too cheesy.**

 **Feedback is always welcome, you guys have been so wonderful to me.**

 **Love Tibbins xx**


End file.
